


Small Town, Jakku

by dark_and_terrible (orphan_account)



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Crimes & Criminals, Detective Noir, Detectives, Eventual Romance, Eventual Sex, F/M, Mutual Pining, Opposites Attract, Organized Crime, Past Relationship(s), Slow Burn, maybe even smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-10
Updated: 2019-04-10
Packaged: 2020-01-10 20:35:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18415373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/dark_and_terrible
Summary: Rey moved to Coruscant when she was seventeen and hasn't spoken to her family since. When she gets a call from her mother telling her that her grandfather has passed away, she's forced to go home. Rey had never had much in common with small town Jakku, and she finds out very quickly that that fact hasn't changed when she finds herself at odds with the sheriff, Ben Solo. That, and one of her old friends has gone missing under mysterious circumstances.





	Small Town, Jakku

It was nearly 4 am when Rey Holdo's phone went off. It was a number she didn't recognize, and she groaned, thinking to let it ring. It rang and rang until her voice mail picked it up. She plopped her head back onto her pillow when the screen went dark, rolling over and attempting to get comfortable again. She had about thirty seconds before it started ringing again. She let out a yelp of frustration. 

"Oh, come on!" 

Her outburst didn't stop the phone from ringing. It kept going until it went to voicemail again. She hoped that whoever it was would just leave a voicemail, but when the phone started ringing a third time, she was pretty sure she needed to pick it up. 

"Hello?" she barked out, angrily. 

"Rey? Honey, is that you?" 

"Who else would it be?" 

"Never could get you up in the morning," the familiar voice said. 

"Mom?" 

Rey felt stupid for not recognizing her mother's voice. Maybe because it was a tremor, a strand of sound that seemed to be pulling itself together as it was falling apart. Rey could hear her sniffling on the other end of the line, and she could hear the shattered quality of her tone more clearly when she spoke again. There was no mistaking that Jakku twang that made it sound like she baked apple pies on the regular. 

"Honey, your grandpa died," she got out after gulping down a few mouthfuls of air. 

Rey heard her exhale on the other line, shakily. 

Rey's heart sank into her stomach. It felt like someone had swung a heavy sack of potatoes at her middle and knocked her off balance, stealing her breath from her. Grandpa Ackbar had always had a hard time healthwise, but he had lived for a lot longer than anyone thought he would. He'd gotten diabetes at a young age and managed it pretty well until grandma died, and he started drinking. After that, it had been bandaid after bandaid until the cabinet was full of those yellow bottles with the kid-safe lids that Rey couldn't get open, even though she was going on no longer being a kid at that time. 

She didn't think she could get them open now, even, at the ripe old age of twenty-seven. 

It had been ten years since she'd left home. 

It had been ten years ago that she promised herself she wouldn't ever set foot in Jakku again. 

"When?" she asked, trying to shake off the vestiges of sleep. 

"Just an hour or so ago," Amylin said. "I--I hate to ask, I know it's the last thing you want, but will you..." 

"Come home?" Rey asked. 

"Yes," she sighed out, relief flooding into her tone. "Please, your sister is out of control and I just--" 

"It's alright. I'll be out as soon as I can get a flight." 

 

Rey would have preferred to drive, but she didn't think she had time for that. It would have been an eight-hour drive, and Rey didn't want to leave her mother hanging for too long. She got out of bed and looked at her phone, chewing on one of her nails. She looked down at her annihilated nail, and broke the remainder of it off, shoving her hand out of the way of her mouth. 

Finally, after bolstering herself up, she dialed her boss. 

"Jesus," he answered on the fiftieth ring. "Are you aware of what time it is?" 

Armitage Hux couldn't help but sound posh. 

"Yeah, I'm sorry. My grandfather died about an hour ago. I need a week." 

She could hear Hux breathing on the other end. He knew she had a fraught relationship with her hometown. How could he know? He had run a background check on her before he'd hired her, and he'd hired her anyway. 

"A week?" Hux asked, already pissed off. She could just tell. 

"Yeah, listen, I have to go." 

"Yes, you do. But a week?" 

"If I can manage less, I'll do less." 

"Alright," Hux sighed out. "Be careful down there. I heard it's the meth capital of the world."

"Fuck you, you did not." 

Hux laughed, but he had already pulled the phone away from his ear and hung up. 

Rey rolled her eyes and fought back a laugh. She would have to google that later. She couldn't say it would have surprised her much if he was right, but knowing Hux, it probably was only the third meth capital in the state. 

She heard her phone ping. She picked it up. It was Hux. 

>>srry abt ur granpa. 

Rey ignored the misspelling. Normally the use of 'ur' in place of 'your' would have sent him into fits, but it was now 4:30 am. He had probably done what she had been trying to do and narrowly avoided dropping his phone on his face when he went back to dreamland. Rey wished she could, but she already knew it was going to be a hell of a long week. 

Rey packed as the pink light of the sunrise filtered in through her window. Before long, it was bright, spilling in from behind the slatted blinds that she pulled shut every night. She kept meaning to replace them, they did little to actually block out the sunlight. It was a chilly morning, but as the sun got higher in the sky, Rey could feel the warmth radiating in from the window. She finished packing, fairly sure she had forgotten a good deal of what she probably needed. She could buy whatever she had forgotten, avoiding the notion that she had been banned from the Stop n Shop for the remainder of her time on the planet. 

Maybe the owner had died. Although no one in Jakku would ever let her live any of that down, she doubted they would die on that hill. 

She hoped they wouldn't, anyway. 

She purchased a criminally expensive flight to the city that was closest to Jakku. It would still be a two-hour drive into Jakku, which meant she was also going to have to rent a car. She began shoving credit cards into her wallet, ones that she had left sitting in her desk for emergencies. She thought that this probably constituted an emergency. She paused to shove her laptop into her carry on backpack.

The flight was only a few hours, but Rey spent two hours stuck in the airport due to a delay. Wind storms causing limited vision. Rey had forgotten about all of the dust and sand that made up her home. She bought a coffee from a bored looking employee at a kiosk that proudly displayed about 50 different flavored syrups, some of them Rey couldn't even imagine putting in coffee. Kettle corn? No thanks. 

By the time she finished the cold brew, she was jittery and regretful. Still tired, just a more anxious version of tired. She was trying not to think about her mother or her grandfather. She thought that if she did, some sort of hidden dam would break and she wouldn't be able to go through with this at all. 

The plane ride was only a few hours, but it felt much longer than that. 

There was a screaming child, screaming because the air pressure changes probably made her very uncomfortable. Rey was sitting right across the row and kept getting apologetic glances from the mother, even though there was very little that anyone could have done about the situation. 

Rey tried to give an apologetic glance back before putting her headphones on and turning them up as high as they would go. She also tried to give the little girl some chewy candy, but not even that would cheer her up. She gave one look at it and promptly went right back to screaming. Rey couldn't help but think to herself: _I feel you, kid._

**Author's Note:**

> Going to see how well these characters do in a noir setting because it's my favorite thing to write. 
> 
> either way, i can promise you, it's gonna be garbo 
> 
> <3


End file.
